Hey everyone :)! Recently I got to know purple carrots which have wonderfully deep violet tint. I loved to include purple potatoes in my bento in the past, but I haven't been able to find them so far in Australia, at least around where I live, that's why I was so happy when I found purple carrots in a local supermarket some time ago, as they're such great substitute for purple potatoes.

This time I used purple water (which I got after boiling a few slices of purple carrots) to colour my quail egg penguins a funky bluish violet. I added nori eyes, cheese beaks, ham cheeks (radish cheeks for the middle penguin) and hat-shaped food picks to make the penguins look somewhat cooler ;).

The sides are very simple: ham and salami flowers, one piece of carved radish, two pieces of cherry tomatoes, two butterfly carrots sitting on top of an eggyolk and a rose shaped takuan (pickled radish) - as you can see, not much cooking involved, as lately I have been too lazy to cook much at all (maybe you have noticed that the size of my bentos is getting smaller and I don't include that much food variety in my bento boxes anymore as in the past).

This bento was requested by a friend of mine, Ms Baggins, for her anniversary with her fiance, who loves Star Wars and Lego. Normally I wouldn't make a Star Wars themed bento myself, since I am not into Star Wars and know almost nothing about it (I am sure you have noticed that most of my bentos are very girly and cute ;)). But since it's a special occasion for both of them, I tried my best in making this bento, even though in my opinion my Yoda resembles Doby the elf from Harry Potter more than Yoda. I slaved away in the kitchen for almost six hours since I made everything from scratch, no store-bought frozen foods or pre-cooked meals this time - so this bento has basically made history in my (well, short) bento making 'career' for being the most elaborate bento ever made, for I had never spent so many hours in the kitchen just for preparing one bento ;). But it was worth the effort and time because the lovely Ms Baggins was very happy with the bento fortunately, and she totally got the Yoda (and the mini nori seaweed cutouts as well, even though they're a bit messy) :).

Anyway, I included quite a variation of food this time:

Yoda - made out of rice coloured with nori seaweed sprinkles (furikake) and cheese for the eyes.

This bento is quite different to the other bentos I've made so far, not really my style actually, but I hope you all still enjoy looking at this Star Wars bento, maybe this is more appealing and interesting for the boys :)? Till next time!

CasaBento sent me these three mini animal sauce containers some time ago. They are pretty damn cute, aren't they :)? My bento today is modeled after these lovely containers. I actually wanted to make a mini quail egg piglet as well, but I wasn't able to fit in the piglet container in my bento box, so I just ended up making two quail egg pandas and one quail egg chick.

As you can see I also used lots of animal food picks in my bento box. They can make a huge difference to your bento, without those picks my bento wouldn't look as festive :).

I had rice sprinkled with seaweed furikake, chicken teriyaki and black beans seasoned with soy sauce, imitation crab wrapped in omelet, blanched broccoli, carrot stars and a small portion of sliced strawberries.